ALASKA'S THOUSAND ISLANDS, AS SEEN FROM SITKA.
The only way out of Sitka harbor, without putting to sea, is back through Peril Straits again; and, passing back, one can hardly realize that it is the same waterway, so radically different are the views presented. In the harbor of Sitka is Japonskoi (Japanese) Island, which may be identified by the captain's chart of the harbor, and which has a curious history. Here, about eighty years ago, an old Japanese junk, that had drifted across the sea on the Kuro-Siwo, or Japanese current, was stranded, and the Russians kindly cared for the castaway sailors who had survived the dreadful drift, and returned them to their country, after an experience that is seldom equaled, even in the romantic accounts of maritime misfortunes. The drifting of Japanese junks, and those of adjacent countries, is not so infrequent as one would suppose, and this fact might set the reflective man to thinking as to the ethnical possibilities accruing therefrom, the settlement of North America, etc.
This Kuro-Siwo, or Japanese current,—sometimes called black current, or Japanese black current, from its hue,—corresponds in many ways to the Gulf Stream of the Atlantic: like it, its waters are warmed in the equatorial regions under a vertical sun; and, like it, a great portion of these waters are carried northward in its flow, and their heat poured upon the eastern shores of its ocean, till their climate is phenomenally temperate compared with the western shores in the same parallels. Sitka is said to have, as a result of facing this current, a mean winter temperature of a point half way between Baltimore and Washington, or slightly milder than the winter temperature of Baltimore. It is said to be no unusual thing to suffer from an ice famine in Sitka. A short way inland the winters are not so temperate, more snow falling at that season, while rain characterizes the coast face; but during the summer, or excursion season, these rains are not unpleasantly frequent. I take the following from a letter from Sitka, and published in the San Francisco Bulletin of January 9, 1882, before this country was really opened to excursionists, although the subject was being discussed, so much had been heard of this wonderland:
“The climate, as shown by the meteorological data collected by the signal service observers, is not of such a disagreeable character as some would have us believe. The scientific data collected and tabulated for the year 1881, as shown by the records at Sitka, Chilkoot, Juneau and Killisnoo, disprove most emphatically the seemingly malicious assertions in reference to its climate.
| April. | May. | June. | July. | Aug. | Sept. | Oct. | Nov. | Dec. | |
| Mean Temperature | 42.5 | 45.4 | 51.2 | 54.2 | 56.7 | 54. | 46.3 | 41.8 | 34.8 |
| Max. Temperature | 56.5 | 61. | 65. | 67. | 79. | 63.8 | 57.8 | 52.8 | 44.9 |
| Min. Temperature | 31. | 31. | 41. | 43. | 43.9 | 40.5 | 32. | 22.5 | 14. |
| Total rainfall, inches | 4.21 | 3.1 | 1.54 | 4.4 | 1.98 | 12.11 | 5.04 | 13.5 | 10.52 |
“A study of the above data, combined with an actual experience, compels the writer to admit that the summer weather of Southeastern Alaska is the most delightful that can be enjoyed throughout the length and breadth of this vast territory, and throws in the shade all the boasted claims of many, if not most, of the famous summer resorts in the ‘States.’ There were only two days during the long, pleasant summer, that were rendered disagreeable by that feeling of oppressiveness caused by heat. The nights were cool and pleasant; the days always warm enough for open windows, through which the invigorating breezes from the snow-capped mountains or the broad Pacific, would blow at will; the long, bright days, when the sun disappeared only for a few hours, when twilight, after sunset, seemed to mingle with the rays of early dawn; the nights beautified by the dancing beams of the aurora borealis, and the myriad stars that seemed as if hung on invisible threads in the deep blue firmament. * * In regard to the summer weather, I reiterate that no one could possibly choose a more delightful place in which to spend a portion of the heated term than in making a trip through this portion of the Territory.”
“In Alaska, in midsummer,” according to a late letter, “the almost continuous light of day shines upon bright green slopes, shaded here and there with dark timber belts, rising up from the deep blue waters. An endless variety of bright-hued flowers, the hum of insects, and melodious song of birds, * * * would cause a stranger, suddenly translated there, to think himself in any country but Alaska.”—Chicago Herald, 1885.
When we are some five or six miles back on our northward way to Peril Straits, a pretty little bay, on Baronoff Island, is pointed out to us, on our starboard (by this time all the passengers are able seamen) side, called Old Harbor, or Starri-Gaven, in Russian. It was there that Baronoff built his first fort, called the Archangel Gabriel, in 1799, which, after a number of rapidly recurring vicissitudes, was annihilated, and its garrison massacred, by the Sitka Indians, three years later. Baronoff re-established his power at the present site of Sitka, calling the new place Archangel Michael,—Archangel Gabriel having failed in his duty as a protector; and from this name it was called New Archangel, which changed to Sitka with the change of flags in 1867, although American maps had dubbed it Sitka before this.
Once more in Chatham Strait, with the ship's head pointed northward, we are on our way to the northernmost recesses of the inland passage, and with the greatest wonders of our wonderland ahead of us. At its northern end, Chatham Strait divides into two narrow waterways, Icy Strait leading off to the west, to the land and waters of glaciers and icebergs, while Lynn Canal continues broad Chatham to the north. Lynn Canal is a double-headed inlet, the western arm at its head being called the Chilkat Inlet, and the eastern arm the Chilkoot Inlet, after two tribes of T'linkit Indians living on these respective channels. It is a beautiful sheet of water, more Alpine in character than any yet entered. Glaciers of blue and emerald ice can be seen almost everywhere, peeping from underneath the snow-capped mountains and ranges that closely enclose this well-protected canal, and render it picturesque in the extreme. Here is the Eagle Glacier on the right, and dozens that have never been named, and a most massive one (Davison's) on our left, just as we enter Chilkat Inlet. At the head of Chilkat Inlet is Pyramid Harbor, so named after an island of pyramidal profile in its waters. It marks the highest point you will probably reach in the inland passage, unless Chilkoot Inlet is entered, which is occasionally done.